As business processes are becoming increasingly complex, the underlying software implementing the business processes is often becoming more difficult to test. One of the challenges in the testing process is the creation of live test conditions to validate the business related performance of the software in a real world situation. Moreover, artificially generated test data often fails to simulate live production conditions in terms of volume and complexity.
Software developers and business users attempt to circumvent the drawback of using test data (instead of live data) by copying the live data (e.g., production data, financial services data, etc.) to the test environment. Copying the live data allows for testing the software under real world conditions without substantially disrupting the business process. However, using live data (e.g., actual customer data) can create security and privacy breaches. Specifically, the live customer data is exposed to several users on a routine basis and the customer may not have provided certain users with permission to have access to such data. In the financial services industry, for example, this breach affects auditors working on bank readiness for financial services companies when security, privacy, and the integrity of customer data are important. In the healthcare industry, for example, such a breach affects patients' rights of privacy and confidentiality of medical information at a time when new federal laws make protecting such information important.
Furthermore, some existing encryption schemes use complex calculations which are time-consuming to perform (e.g., modulus operation), or inaccurate methods which are often unreliable (e.g., mapping dictionary words). In view of the foregoing, a need exists for systems and methods which facilitate encrypting data (e.g., information), so that unauthorized users can access only parts of the data. Moreover, a need exists for a high speed encryption routine for large and numerous customer files, including robust encryption that is quickly reversible.